Senate must only confirm new FEC Commissioners who will enforce the law

Today, 5 Republicans and 4 Democrats who served in Congress urged Senate leadership to fix the Federal Election Commission by only confirming nominees who would faithfully execute the nation’s campaign laws. The nine former members are all part of Issue One’s ReFormers Caucus, the largest bipartisan coalition of its kind ever assembled to advocate for solutions to fix the broken political system. 

“The American people deserve an FEC that is fully functioning and faithfully enforcing current laws…We strongly encourage you to refuse to confirm any FEC nominee who will not enforce campaign laws according to the Constitution, as Congress intended,” the signers wrote in their letter to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-NY), Senator Roy Blunt (R-MO), and Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), chair and ranking member of the Senate Rules & Administration Committee.

“Confirming new commissioners who are opposed to enforcing the law would only extend the current dysfunction and dismantle the power of Congress.”

Issue One has continued to spotlight how the FEC is dysfunctional — and how long it has remained without a quorum — through deep-dive reports and its FECMIA project. To date, the FEC has been effectively shut down for more than 151 days and has more than 300 cases on its enforcement docket that cannot be resolved until the agency regains a quorum, and the statute of limitations may expire for about 70 of these cases before then, according to Bloomberg Government. 

Signers on the letter include:

Former Ambassador & Representative Tim Roemer (D-IN), Issue One ReFormers Caucus Co-chair

Former Representative Zach Wamp (R-TN), Issue One ReFormers Caucus Co-chair

Former CIA Director & Representative Porter Goss (R-FL)

Former Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI)

Former Senator Mary Landrieu (D-LA)

Former Representative Jim Gerlach (R-PA)

Former Representative Sue Myrick (R-NC)

Former Representative Claudine Schneider (R-RI)

Former Representative Lynn Woolsey (D-CA)

Read the full letter.